Rates spread far and wide

I THINK amal­ga­ma­tion of coun­cils is a stupid idea. Ever since it was brought in our rates have soared and no one is sat­is­fied. Fancy places as far away as Gin Gin and Childers, Yan­daran and be­yond, hav­ing to pay rates to Bund­aberg Re­gional Coun­cil. What do re­mote ru­ral ar­eas get for their rates? Bring back the shires. Beau­ti­ful Bar­gara is too large now to have to be tied to Bund­aberg’s apron strings. All of the coastal ar­eas have grown, in­clud­ing Woodgate. Be­fore amal­ga­ma­tion it was said that Childers, through good man­age­ment, was com­pletely debt free. We now have a sit­u­a­tion where rates have to be spread far and wide yet ben­e­fits all seem to be mea­gre. Let each sec­tion take care of their own ar­eas. Use their own rates for their own pur­poses, and ev­ery­one would be bet­ter looked af­ter. Get rid of the ward sys­tem. I pre­fer to be able to se­lect from all coun­cil can­di­dates and not have some­one foisted upon us, be­cause of the sec­tion sys­tem. Another no-no is selling off coun­cil-owned land. That land may be needed in years to come. My hus­band Bob and I have been pay­ing rates to Bund­aberg coun­cil for the past 60 years. I guess noth­ing will change and we just have to go on pay­ing our rates and cop what is handed out by our coun­cil.